SKETCH OF SOCIAL HISTORY.
The Importation of the Africans—Character of the Colored Population in 1860—Colored Population in British West Indian Possessions—Free Colored People of the South—Free Colored People of the North—Notes.
Professor DuBois, in his exhaustive work upon the "Suppression of the African Slave-Trade," has brought within comparatively narrow limits the great mass of facts bearing upon his subject, and in synopses and indices has presented all of the more important literature it has induced. In his Monograph, published as Volume II of the Harvard Historical Series, he has traced the rise of this nefarious traffic, especially with reference to the American colonies, exhibited the proportions to which it expanded, and the tenacity with which it held on to its purpose until it met its death in the fate of the ill-starred Southern Confederacy. Every step in his narrative is supported by references to unimpeachable authorities; and the scholarly Monograph bears high testimony to the author's earnest labor, painstaking research and unswerving fidelity. Should the present work stimulate inquiry beyond the scope herein set before the reader, he is most confidently referred to Professor Du Bois' book as containing a complete exposition of the development and overthrow of that awful crime.
It is from this work, however, that we shall obtain a nearer and clearer view of the African planted upon our shores. Negro slavery began at an early day in the North American Colonies; but up until the Revolution of 1688 the demand for slaves was mainly supplied from England, the slaves being white.[1] "It is probable," says Professor DuBois, "that about 25,000 slaves were brought to America each year between 1698 and 1707, and after 1713 it rose to perhaps 30,000 annually. "Before the Revolution the total exportation to America is variously estimated as between 40,000 and 100,000 each year." Something of the horrors of the "Middle Passage" may be shown by the records that out of 60,783 slaves shipped from Africa during the years 1680-88, 14,387, or nearly one-fourth of the entire number, perished at sea. In 1790 there were in the country nearly seven hundred thousand Africans, these having been introduced by installments from various heathen tribes. The importation of slaves continued with more or less success up until 1858, when the "Wanderer" landed her cargo of 500 in Georgia.
During the period from 1790 to the breaking out of the Civil War, shortly after the landing of the last cargo of slaves, the colored population, both slave and free, had arisen to about four million, and had undergone great modifications. The cargo of the "Wanderer" found themselves among strangers, even when trying to associate with those who in color and hair were like themselves. The slaves of 1860 differed greatly from the slaves of a hundred years earlier. They had lost the relics of that stern warlike spirit which prompted the Stono insurrection, the Denmark Vesey insurrection, and the Nat Turner insurrection, and had accepted their lot as slaves, hoping that through God, freedom would come to them some time in the happy future. Large numbers of them had become Christians through the teaching of godly white women, and at length through the evangelistic efforts of men and women of their own race. Independent religious organizations had been formed in the North, and large local churches with Negro pastors were in existence in the South when the "Wanderer" landed her cargo. There had been a steady increase in numbers, indicating that the physical well-being of the slave was not overlooked, and the slaves had greatly improved in character. Sales made in South Carolina between 1850 and 1860 show "boys," from 16 to 25 years of age, bringing from $900 to $1000; and "large sales" are reported showing an "average of $620 each," "Negro men bringing from $800 to $1000," and a "blacksmith" bringing $1425. The averages generally obtained were above $600. A sale of 109 Negroes in families is reported in the "Charleston Courier" in which the writer says: "Two or three families averaged from $1000 to $1100 for each individual." The same item states also that "C.G. Whitney sold two likely female house servants, one for $1000, the other for $1190." These cases are presented to illustrate the financial value of the American slave, and inferentially the progress he had made in acquiring the arts of modern civilization. Slaves had become blacksmiths, wheelwrights, carriage-makers, carpenters, bricklayers, tailors, bootmakers, founders and moulders, not to mention all the common labor performed by them. Slave women had become dressmakers, hairdressers, nurses and the best cooks to be found in the world. The slave-holders regarded themselves as the favored of mankind because of the competence and faithfulness of their slaves. The African spirit and character had disappeared, and in their place were coming into being the elements of a new character, existing in 1860 purely in a negative form. The slave had become an American. He was now a civilized slave, and had received his civilization from his masters. He had separated himself very far from his brother slave in St. Domingo. The Haytian Negro fought and won his freedom before he had been civilized in slavery, and hence has never passed over the same ground that his American fellow-servant has been compelled to traverse.
Beside the slaves in the South, there were also several thousand "free persons of color," as they were called, dwelling in such cities as Richmond, Va., Charleston, S.C., and New Orleans, La. Some of these had become quite wealthy and well-educated, forming a distinct class of the population. They were called Creoles in Louisiana, and were accorded certain privileges, although laws were carefully enacted to keep alive the distinction between them and the whites. In Charleston the so-called colored people set themselves up as a class, prided themselves much upon their color and hair and in their sympathies joined almost wholly with the master class. Representatives of their class became slave-holders and were in full accord with the social policy of the country. Nevertheless their presence was an encouragement to the slave, and consequently was objected to by the slave-holder. The free colored man became more and more disliked in the South as the slave became more civilized. He was supposed by his example to contribute to the discontent of the slave, and laws were passed restricting his priveleges so as to induce him to leave. Between 1850 and 1860 this question reached a crisis and free colored people from the South were to be seen taking up their homes in the Northern States and in Canada. (Many of the people, especially from Charleston, carried with them all their belittling prejudices, and after years of sojourn under the sway of enlightened and liberal ideas, proved themselves still incapable of learning the new way or forgetting the old.)
There were, then, three very distinct classes of colored people in the country, to wit: The slave in the South, the free colored people of the South, and the free colored people of the North. These were also sub-divided into several smaller classes. Slaves were divided into field hands, house servants and city slaves. The free colored people of the South had their classes based usually on color; the free colored people of the North had their divisions caused by differences in religion, differences as to place of birth, and numerous family conceits. So that surveyed as a whole, it is extremely difficult to get anything like a complete social map of these four millions as they existed at the outbreak of the Civil War.
For a quarter of a century there had been a steady concentration of the slave population within the cotton and cane-growing region, the grain-growing States of Delaware, Maryland and Virginia having become to a considerable extent breeding farms. Particularly was this the case with the more intelligent and higher developed individual slaves who appeared near the border line. The master felt that such persons would soon make their escape by way of the "Underground Railroad" or otherwise, and hence in order to prevent a total loss, would follow the dictates of business prudence and sell his bright slave man to Georgia. The Maryland or Virginia slave who showed suspicious aspirations was usually checked by the threat, "I'll sell you to Georgia;" and if the threat did not produce the desired reformation it was not long before the ambitious slave found himself in the gang of that most despised and most despicable of all creatures, the Georgia slave-trader. Georgia and Canada were the two extremes of the slave's anticipation during the last decade of his experience. These stood as his earthly Heaven and Hell, the "Underground Railroad," with its agents, conducting to one, and the odious slave-trader, driving men, women and children, to the other. No Netherlander ever hated and feared the devil more thoroughly than did the slaves of the border States hate and fear these outrages on mankind, the kidnapping slave-traders of the cotton and cane regions. I say kidnapping, for I have myself seen persons in Georgia who had been kidnapped in Maryland. If the devil was ever incarnate, I think it safe to look for him among those who engaged in the slave-trade, whether in a foreign or domestic form.
Nothing is more striking in connection with the history of American Slavery than the conduct of Great Britain on the same subject. So inconsistent has this conduct been that it can be explained only by regarding England as a conglomerate of two elements nearly equal in strength, of directly opposite character, ruling alternately the affairs of the nation. As a slave-trader and slave-holder England was perhaps even worse than the United States. Under her rule the slave decreased in numbers, and remained a savage. In Jamaica, in St. Vincent, in British Guiana, in Barbadoes, in Trinidad and in Grenada, British slavery was far worse than American slavery. In these colonies "the slave was generally a barbarian, speaking an unknown tongue, and working with men like himself, in gangs with scarcely a chance for improvement." An economist says, had the slaves of the British colonies been as well fed, clothed, lodged, and otherwise cared for as were those of the United States, their number at emancipation would have reached from seventeen to twenty millions, whereas the actual number emancipated was only 660,000. Had the blacks of the United States experienced the same treatment as did those of the British colonies, 1860 would have found among us less than 150,000 colored persons. In the United States were found ten colored persons for every slave imported, while in the British colonies only one was found for every three imported. Hence the claim that the American Negro is a new race, built up on this soil, rests upon an ample supply of facts. The American slave was born in our civilization, fed upon good American food, housed and clothed on a civilized plan, taught the arts and language of civilization, acquired necessarily ideas of law and liberty, and by 1860 was well on the road toward fitness for freedom. No lessons therefore drawn from the emancipation of British slaves in the West Indies are of any direct value to us, inasmuch as British slavery was not like American slavery, the British freedman was in no sense the equal of the American freedman, and the circumstances surrounding the emancipation of the British slave had nothing of the inspiring and ennobling character with those connected with the breaking of the American Negro's chains. Yet, superior as the American Negro was as a slave, he was very far below the standard of American citizenship as subsequent events conclusively proved. The best form of slavery, even though it may lead toward fitness for freedom, can never be regarded as a fit school in which to graduate citizens of so magnificent an empire as the United States.
The slave of 1860 was perhaps, all things considered, the best slave the world had ever seen, if we except those who served the Hebrews under the Mosaic statutes. While there was no such thing among them as legal marriage or legitimate childhood, yet slave "families" were recognized even on the auction block, and after emancipation legal family life was erected generally upon relationships which had been formed in slavery. Bishop Gaines, himself born a slave of slave parents, says: "The Negro had no civil rights under the codes of the Southern States. It was often the case, it is true, that the marriage ceremony was performed, and thousands of couples regarded it, and observed it as of binding force, and were as true to each other as if they had been lawfully married." * * * "The colored people generally," he says, "held their marriage (if such unauthorized union may be called marriage) sacred, even while they were slaves. Many instances will be recalled by the older people of the life-long fidelity which existed between the slave and his concubine" (Wife, T.G.S.)" ... the mother of his children. My own father and mother lived together over sixty years. I am the fourteenth child of that union, and I can truthfully affirm that no marriage, however made sacred by the sanction of law, was ever more congenial and beautiful. Thousands of like instances might be cited to the same effect. It will always be to the credit of the colored people that almost without exception, they adhered to their relations, illegal though they had been, and accepted gladly the new law which put the stamp of legitimacy upon their union and removed the brand of bastardy from the brows of their children."
Let us now sum up the qualifications that these people possessed in large degree, in order to determine their fitness for freedom, then so near at hand. They had acquired the English language, and the Christian religion, including the Christian idea of marriage, so entirely different in spirit and form from the African marriage. They had acquired the civilized methods of cooking their food, making and wearing clothes, sleeping in beds, and observing Sunday. They had acquired many of the useful arts and trades of civilization and had imbibed the tastes and feelings, to some extent, at least, of the country in which they lived. Becoming keen observers, shut out from books and newspapers, they listened attentively, learned more of law and politics than was generally supposed. They knew what the election of 1860 meant and were on tiptoe with expectation. Although the days of insurrection had passed and the slave of '59 was not ready to rise with the immortal John Brown, he had not lost his desire for freedom. The steady march of escaping slaves guided by the North star, with the refrain:
"I'm on my way to Canada,
That cold but happy land;
The dire effects of slavery
I can no longer stand,"
proved that the desire to be free was becoming more extensive and absorbing as the slave advanced in intelligence.
It is necessary again to emphasize the fact that the American slaves were well formed and well developed physically, capable of enduring hard labor and of subsisting upon the plainest food. Their diet for years had been of the simplest sort, and they had been subjected to a system of regulations very much like those which are employed in the management of armies. They had an hour to go to bed and an hour to rise; left their homes only upon written "passes," and when abroad at night were often halted by the wandering patrol. "Run, nigger, run, the patrol get you," was a song of the slave children of South Carolina.
Strangers who saw for the first time these people as they came out of slavery in 1865 were usually impressed with their robust appearance, and a conference of ex-slaves, assembled soon after the war, introduced a resolution with the following declaration: "Whereas, Slavery has left us in possession of strong and healthy bodies." It is probable that at least a half-million of men of proper age could then have been found among the newly liberated capable of bearing arms. They were inured to the plain ration, to labor and fatigue, and to subordination, and had long been accustomed to working together under the immediate direction of foremen.
Two questions of importance naturally arose at this period: First, did the American slave understand the issue that had been before the country for more than a half-century and that was now dividing the nation in twain and marshalling for deadly strife these two opposing armies? Second, had he the courage necessary to take part in the struggle and help save the Union? It would be a strange thing to say, but nevertheless a thing entirely true, that many of the Negro slaves had a clearer perception of the real question at issue than did some of our most far-seeing statesmen, and a clearer vision of what would be the outcome of the war. While the great men of the North were striving to establish the doctrine that the coming war was merely to settle the question of Secession, the slave knew better. God had hid certain things from the wise and prudent and had revealed them unto babes. Lincoln, the wisest of all, was slow to see that the issue he himself had predicted was really at hand. As President, he declared for the preservation of the Union, with or without slavery, or even upon the terms which he had previously declared irreconcilable, "half slave and half free." The Negro slave saw in the outbreak of the war the death struggle of slavery. He knew that the real issue was slavery.
The masters were careful to keep from the knowledge of the slave the events as well as the causes of the war, but in spite of these efforts the slave's keen perception enabled him to read defeat in the dejected mien of his master, and victory in his exultation. To prevent the master's knowing what was going on in their thoughts, the slaves constructed curious codes among themselves. In one neighborhood freedom was always spoken of as "New Rice"; and many a poor slave woman sighed for the coming of New Rice in the hearing of those who imagined they knew the inmost thoughts of their bondwomen. Gleefully at times they would talk of the jollification they would make when the New Rice came. It was this clear vision, this strong hope, that sustained them during the trying days of the war and kept them back from insurrection. Bishop Gaines says: "Their prayers ascended for their deliverance, and their hearts yearned for the success of their friends. They fondly hoped for the hour of victory, when the night of slavery would end and the dawn of freedom appear. They often talked to each other of the progress of the war and conferred in secret as to what they might do to aid in the struggle. Worn out with long bondage, yearning for the boon of freedom, longing for the sun of liberty to rise, they kept their peace and left the result to God." Mr. Douglass, whom this same Bishop Gaines speaks of very inappropriately as a "half-breed," seemed able to grasp the feelings both of the slave and the freeman and said: "From the first, I for one, saw in this war the end of slavery, and truth requires me to say that my interest in the success of the North was largely due to this belief." Mr. Seward, the wise Secretary of State, had thought that the war would come and go without producing any change in the relation of master and slave; but the humble slave on the Georgia cotton plantation, or in the Carolina rice fields, knew that the booming of the guns of rebellion in Charleston was the opening note of the death knell of slavery. The slave undoubtedly understood the issue, and knew on which side liberty dwelt. Although thoroughly bred to slavery, and as contented and happy as he could be in his lot, he acted according to the injunction of the Apostle: "Art thou called being a servant, care not for it; but if thou mayest be made free, use it rather." The slaves tried to be contented, but they preferred freedom and knew which side to take when the time came for them to act.
Enough has been said to show that out of the African slave had been developed a thoroughly American slave, so well imbued with modern civilization and so well versed in American politics, as to be partially ready for citizenship. He had become law-abiding and order-loving, and possessed of an intelligent desire to be free. Whether he had within him the necessary moral elements to become a soldier the pages following will attempt to make known. He had the numbers, the physical strength and the intelligence. He could enter the strife with a sufficient comprehension of the issues involved to enable him to give to his own heart a reason for his action. Fitness for the soldier does not necessarily involve fitness for citizenship, but the actual discharge of the duties of the soldier in defence of the nation, entitles one to all common rights, to the nation's gratitude, and to the highest honors for which he is qualified.
In concluding this chapter I shall briefly return to the free colored people of the South that the reader may be able to properly estimate their importance as a separate element. Their influence upon the slave population was very slight, inasmuch as law and custom forbade the intercourse of these two classes.
According to the Census of 1860 there were in the slave-holding States altogether 261,918 free colored persons, 106,770 being mulattoes. In Charleston there were 887 free blacks and 2,554 mulattoes; in Mobile, 98 free blacks and 617 mulattoes; in New Orleans, 1,727 blacks and 7,357 mulattoes. As will be seen, nearly one-half of the entire number of free colored persons were mulattoes, while in the leading Southern cities seventy-five per cent. of the free colored people were put in this class. The percentage of mulatto slaves to the total slave population at that time was 10.41, and in the same cities which showed seventy-five per cent, of all the free colored persons mulattoes, the percentage of mulatto slaves was but 16.84. Mulatto in this classification includes all colored persons who are not put down as black.
In New Orleans the free mulattoes were generally French, having come into the Union with the Louisiana purchase, and among them were to be found wealthy slave-holders. They much resembled the class of mulattoes which obtained in St. Domingo at the beginning of the century, and had but little sympathy with the blacks, although they were the first to acquiesce in emancipation, some of them actually leading their own slaves into the army of liberation. It is possible, however, that they had not fully realized the trend of the war, inasmuch as New Orleans was excepted from the effects of the Proclamation. It is certain that the free colored people of that city made a tender of support to the Confederacy, although they were among the first to welcome the conquering "Yankees," and afterward fought with marked gallantry in the Union cause. The free mulattoes, or browns, as they called themselves, of Charleston, followed much the same course as their fellow classmen of New Orleans. Here, too, they had been exclusive and to some extent slave-holders, had tendered their services to the Confederacy, and had hastily come forward to welcome the conquerors. They were foremost among the colored people in wealth and intelligence, but their field of social operations had been so circumscribed that they had exerted but little influence in the work of Americanizing the slave. Separated from the slave by law and custom they did all in their power to separate themselves from him in thought and feeling. They drew the line against all blacks as mercilessly and senselessly as the most prejudiced of the whites and were duplicates of the whites placed on an intermediate plane. It was not unusual to find a Charleston brown filled with more prejudice toward the blacks than were the whites.
[Transcriber's Note: This footnote text appeared without a footnote anchor: "Census of 1860.">[
The colored people of the North in 1860 numbered 237,283, Pennsylvania having the largest number, 56,849; then came New York with 49,005; Ohio, 36,673; New Jersey, 25,318; Indiana, 11,428; Massachusetts, 9,602; Connecticut, 8,627; Illinois, 7,628; Michigan, 6,799; Rhode Island, 3,952; Maine, 1,327; Wisconsin, 1,171; Iowa, 1,069; Vermont, 709; Kansas, 625; New Hampshire, 494; Minnesota, 259; Oregon, 128.
Considerably more than one-half of this population was located within the States along the Atlantic Coast, viz.; Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Vermont, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, Pennsylvania and New Jersey. Here were to be found 154,883 free colored people. Pennsylvania, New York and New Jersey took the lead in this population, with Massachusetts and Connecticut coming next, while Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont had but few. The cities, Boston, New York and Philadelphia, were the largest cities of free colored people then in the North. In Boston there were 2,261; New York City, 12,574, while in Philadelphia there were 22,185
As early as 1787 the free colored people of Philadelphia, through two distinguished representatives, Absalom Jones and Richard Allen, "two men of the African race," as the chroniclers say, "saw the irreligious and uncivilized state" of the "people of their complexion," and finally concluded "that a society should be formed without regard to religious tenets, provided the persons lived an orderly and sober life," the purpose of the society being "to support one another in sickness and for the benefit of their widows and fatherless children." Accordingly a society was established, known as the Free African Society of Philadelphia, and on the 17th, 5th-mo., 1787, articles were published, including the following, which is inserted to show the breadth of the society's purpose:
"And we apprehend it to be necessary that the children of our deceased members be under the care of the Society, so far as to pay for the education of their children, if they cannot attend free school; also to put them out apprentices to suitable trades or places, if required."[2]
Shortly after this we read of "the African School for the free instruction of the black people," and in 1796, "The Evening Free School, held at the African Methodist Meeting House in Philadelphia" was reported as being "kept very orderly, the scholars behaving in a becoming manner, and their improvement beyond the teachers' expectations, their intellects appearing in every branch of learning to be equal to those of the fairest complexion." The name African, as the reader will notice, is used with reference to school, church, and individuals; although not to the complete exclusion of "colored people" and "people of color." These phrases seem to have been coined in the West Indies, and were there applied only to persons of mixed European and African descent. In the United States they never obtained such restricted use except in a very few localities. The practice of using African as a descriptive title of the free colored people of the North became very extensive and so continued up to the middle of the century. There were African societies, churches and schools in all the prominent centres of this population.
In 1843 one, Mr. P. Loveridge, Agent for Colored Schools of New York, wrote the editor of the African Methodist Magazine as follows:[3] "As to the name of your periodical, act as we did with the name of our schools—away with Africa. There are no Africans in your connection. Substitute colored for African and it will be, in my opinion, as it should be." The earnestness of the writer shows that the matter of parting with African was then a live question. The cool reply of the editor indicates how strong was the conservative element among the African people of '43. He says: "We are unable to see the reasonableness of the remarks. It is true we are not Africans, or natives born upon the soil of Africa, yet, as the descendants of that race, how can we better manifest that respect due to our fathers who begat us, than by the adoption of the term in our institutions, and inscribing it upon our public places of resort?" To this Mr. Loveridge rejoins in the following explanatory paragraph: "We who are engaged in the Public Schools in this city found upon examination of about 1500 children who attend our schools from year to year, not one African child among them. A suggestion was made that we petition the Public School Society to change the name African to Colored Schools. The gentlemen of that honorable body, perceiving our petition to be a logical one, acquiesced with us. Hence the adjective African (which does not apply to us) was blotted out and Colored substituted in its place. It is 'Public Schools for Colored Children.' We are Americans and expect American sympathies."
In 1816 the colored Methodists conceived the idea of organizing and evangelizing their race, and to this end a convention was called and assembled in Philadelphia of that year, composed of sixteen delegates, coming from Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland and New Jersey. The convention adopted a resolution that the people of Philadelphia, Baltimore and all other places who should unite with them, should become one body under the name and style of the African Methodist Episcopal Church. Similar action was taken by two other bodies of colored Methodists, one in New York, the other in Wilmington, Delaware, about the same time. The people were coming together and beginning to understand the value of organization. This was manifested in their religious, beneficial and educational associations that were springing up among them. In 1841 the African Methodist Magazine appeared, the first organ of religious communication and thought issued by the American colored people. It was published in Brooklyn, N.Y., Rev. George Hogarth being its editor.
There were papers published by the colored people prior to the appearance of the African Methodist Magazine, but these were individual enterprises. They were, however, indices of the thought of the race, and looking back upon them now, we may regard them as mile-stones set up along the line of march over which the people have come. New York, city and State, appears to have been the home of these early harbingers, and it was there that the earliest literary centre was established, corresponding to that centre of religious life and thought which had been earlier founded in Philadelphia. In 1827 the first newspaper published on this continent by colored men issued from its office in New York. It was called "Freedom's Journal," and had for its motto "Righteousness exalteth a nation." Its editors and proprietors were Messrs. Cornish & Russwurm. Its name was subsequently changed to the "Rights of All," Mr. Cornish probably retiring, and in 1830 it suspended, Mr. Russwurm going to Africa. Then followed "The Weekly Advocate," "The American," "The Colored American," "The Elevator," "The National Watchman," "The Clarion," "The Ram's Horn," "The North Star," "Frederick Douglass' Paper," and finally that crowning literary work of the race, "The Anglo-African."
"The Anglo-African" appeared in 1859, under the management of the strongest and most brilliant purely literary families the American Negro up to that time had produced. It was edited and published by Thomas Hamilton, and like all the important literary ventures of the race in those days, had its birth in New York. It came out in 1859 and continued through the war, and in 1865 went out of existence honorably, having its work well done. Its first volume, that of 1859, contains the ablest papers ever given to the public by the American Negro; and taken as a whole this volume is the proudest literary monument the race has as yet erected.
Reviewing the progress of the race in the North, we may say, the period of organized benevolence and united religious effort began before the close of the past century, Philadelphia being its place of origin; that the religious movement reached much broader and clearer standing about 1816, and in consequence there sprang up organizations comprehending the people of the whole country; that the religious movement advanced to a more intellectual stage when in 1841 the African Methodist Magazine appeared, since which time the organized religion of the American Negro has never been for any considerable time without its organs of communication. The journalistic period began in 1827, its centre being New York and the work of the journals almost wholly directed to two ends: the abolition of slavery, and the enfranchisement and political elevation of the free blacks. This work had reached its highest form in the Anglo-African, as that epoch of our national history came to its close in the slave-holders' war.
The titles of the newspapers indicate the opening and continuance of a period of anti-slavery agitation. Their columns were filled with arguments and appeals furnished by men who gave their whole souls to the work. It was a period of great mental activity on the part of the free colored people. They were discussing all probable methods of bettering their condition. It was the period that produced both writers and orators. In 1830 the first convention called by colored men to consider the general condition of the race and devise means to improve that condition, met in the city of Philadelphia. The history of this convention is so important that I append a full account of it as published in the Anglo-African nearly thirty years after the convention met. It was called through the efforts of Hezekiah Grice, of Baltimore, who afterwards emigrated to Hayti, and for many years followed there the occupation of carver and gilder and finally became Director of Public Works of the city of Port-au-Prince. While visiting that city years ago, I met a descendant of Mr. Grice, a lady of great personal beauty, charming manners, accomplished in the French language, but incapable of conversing at all in English.
The conventions, begun in 1830, continued to be held annually for a brief period, and then dropped into occasional and special gatherings. They did much good in the way of giving prominence to the colored orators and in stemming the tide of hostile sentiment by appealing to the country at large in language that reached many hearts.
The physical condition, so far as the health and strength of the free colored people were concerned, was good. Their mean age was the greatest of any element of our population, and their increase was about normal, or 1.50 per cent. annually. In the twenty years from 1840 to 1860 it had kept up this rate with hardly the slightest variation, while the increase of the free colored people of the South during the same period had been 1 per cent, annually.[4] The increase of persons of mixed blood in the North did not necessarily imply laxity of morals, as the census compilers always delighted to say, but could be easily accounted for by the marriages occurring between persons of this class. I have seen more than fifty persons, all of mixed blood, descend from one couple, and these with the persons joined to them by marriages as they have come to marriageable age, amounted to over seventy souls—all in about a half century. That the slaves had, despite their fearful death rate, the manumissions and the escapes, increased twice as fast as the free colored people of the North, three times as fast as the free colored people of the South, and faster than the white people with all the immigration of that period, can be accounted for only by the enormous birth rate of that people consequent upon their sad condition. Their increase was abnormal, and when properly viewed, proves too much.
There is no way of determining the general wealth of the colored people of the North at the period we are describing; but some light may be thrown upon their material condition from the consideration that they were supporting a few publications and building and supporting churches, and were holders of considerable real estate. In New York city, the thirteen thousand colored people paid taxes on nearly a million and a half in real estate, and had over a quarter million of dollars in the savings banks. It is probable that the twenty-five thousand in Philadelphia owned more in proportion than their brethren in New York, for they were then well represented in business in that city. There were the Fortens, Bowers, Casseys, Gordons, and later Stephen Smith, William Whipper and Videl, all of whom were men of wealth and business. There were nineteen churches owned and supported by colored people of Philadelphia, with a seating capacity of about 10,000 and valued at about $250,000.
[5]The schools set apart for colored children were very inferior and were often kept alive by great sacrifices on the part of the colored people themselves. Prior to the war and in many cases for some time afterward, the colored public schools were a disgrace to the country. A correspondent writing from Hollidaysburg, Pa., says, speaking of the school there: "The result of my inquiries here is that here, as in the majority of other places, the interest manifested for the colored man is more for political effect, and that those who prate the loudest about the moral elevation and political advancement of the colored man are the first to turn against him when he wants a friend." The correspondent then goes on to say that the school directors persist in employing teachers "totally incompetent." What the schools were in New York the report made by the New York Society for the promotion of Education among Colored Children to the Honorable Commissioners for examining into the condition of Common Schools in the City and County of New York, will show. Reverend Charles B. Ray, who was President of this Society, and Philip A. White, its Secretary, both continued to labor in the interest of education unto the close of their lives, Mr. White dying as a member of the School Board of the city of Brooklyn, and Mr. Ray bequeathing his library to Wilberforce University at his death.
In summing up the conditions which they have detailed in their report they say: "From a comparison of the school houses occupied by the colored children with the splendid, almost palatial edifices, with manifold comforts, conveniences and elegancies which make up the school houses for white children in the city of New York, it is clearly evident that the colored children are painfully neglected and positively degraded. Pent up in filthy neighborhoods, in old dilapidated buildings, they are held down to low associations and gloomy surroundings. * * * The undersigned enter their solemn protest against this unjust treatment of colored children. They believe with the experience of Massachusetts, and especially the recent experience of Boston before them, there is no sound reason why colored children shall be excluded from any of the common schools supported by taxes levied alike on whites and blacks, and governed by officers elected by the vote of colored as well as white voters."
This petition and remonstrance had its effect, for mainly through its influence within two years very great improvements were made in the condition of the New York colored schools.
For the especial benefit of those who erroneously think that the purpose of giving industrial education is a new thing in our land, as well as for general historical purposes, I call attention to the establishment of the Institute for Colored Youth in Philadelphia in 1842. This Institute was founded by the Society of Friends, and was supported in its early days and presumably still "by bequests and donations made by members of that Society." The objects of the Institute as set forth by its founders, fifty-seven years ago, are: "The education and improvement of colored youth of both sexes, to qualify them to act as teachers and instructors to their own people, either in the various branches of school learning or the mechanic arts and agriculture." Two years later the African Methodists purchased one hundred and eighty acres of land in eastern Ohio and established what was called the Union Seminary, on the manual labor plan. It did not succeed, but it lingered along, keeping alive the idea, until it was eclipsed by Wilberforce University, into which it was finally merged.
The anti-slavery fight carried on in the North, into which the colored men entered and became powerful leaders, aroused the race to a deep study of the whole subject of liberty and brought them in sympathy with all people who had either gained or were struggling for their liberties, and prompted them to investigate all countries offering to them freedom. No country was so well studied by them as Hayti, and from 1824 to 1860 there had been considerable emigration thither. Liberia, Central and South America and Canada were all considered under the thought of emigration. Thousands went to Hayti and to Canada, but the bulk preferred to remain here. They liked America, and had become so thoroughly in love with the doctrines of the Republic, so imbued with the pride of the nation's history, so inspired with hope in the nation's future, that they resolved to live and die on her soil. When the troublous times of 1860 came and white men were fleeing to Canada, colored men remained at their posts. They were ready to stand by the old flag and to take up arms for the Union, trusting that before the close of the strife the flag might have to them a new meaning. An impassioned colored orator had said of the flag: "Its stars were for the white man, and its stripes for the Negro, and it was very appropriate that the stripes should be red." The free Negro of the North was prepared in 1861 to support Abraham Lincoln with 40,000 as good American-born champions for universal liberty as the country could present.